ThinkBalm Innovation Community Becomes Tandem Learning Innovation Community

After we broke the news that we planned to disband the ThinkBalm Innovation Community, members of the community expressed lots of interest in finding new leadership for the community moving forward. We are excited to announce that effective immediately, Tandem Learning will assume the community management responsibilities of the newly named Tandem Learning Innovation Community.

The value of this community is in the membership and the collective wisdom and experience of the group, and Tandem’s focus on new technology, user experience, learning design, and strategic business innovation allows them to touch on the areas of interest that bind our community together. We believe the leadership at Tandem is committed to maintaining the integrity of the community while finding new and exciting ways to add value to everyone who participates.

Exciting times are ahead for all of us and we’re looking forward to what happens next!

Erica Driver, co-founder and principal, ThinkBalm
Sam Driver, co-founder and principal, ThinkBalm


We’re so pleased to have the opportunity to continue the amazing work that Erica and Sam began in 2008 as we assume responsibility for the newly deemed Tandem Learning Innovation Community. While we know many of you from our work in virtual worlds and immersive technologies, we’re looking forward to interacting with all of you in the weeks ahead as we plan for the future of the community. In our new role as the community managers, we will honor the tenants of the community as established under ThinkBalm and will seek even more ways to bring value to our members. Please feel free to contact me directly with your thoughts, ideas, and feedback...this community belongs to all of us and it’s your input that will continue to make it valuable and successful.

Koreen Olbrish, CEO, Tandem Learning
Koreen.olbrish@tandem-learning.com

Interview with the Newest Hire at Tandem Learning: Tim Martin

Who is Tim Martin?

As part of introducing the newest Tandem Learning team member, Tim Martin, we conducted a brief interview to get inside his head and help answer the question: Who is Tim Martin?

Jedd Gold: Tim, we couldn’t be more excited to have you as part of the Tandem team. Welcome!

Tim Martin: Thanks, glad to be here.

JG: You obviously have a long and respected career in the eLearning industry and have accomplished a lot. But before we get into that, let’s get to know the REAL Tim Martin.

TM: Sounds good – where do you want to start.

JG: I hear your art is housed at the MOMA – true or false?

TM: Well, one of my hobbies is printmaking, making etchings and artist books. I do have artwork that is held in many private and public collections, including the Franklyn Furnace Artist Book Collection at the Museum of Modern Art in New York.

JG: Amazing. You’ll have to show us some of your work sometime. So you said “one” of your hobbies… what else do you do in your spare time? (not that you should expect to have much from here on out…)

TM: Those who know me well know my passion for ethnographic filmmaking. I am a working anthropologist, and I study the African Diaspora and migration of traditional belief systems resulting from slavery. I have been documenting Haitian Voodoo with Marilyn Houlberg since 1984. I am also a Returned Peace Corps Volunteer having served in São Tomé and Príncipe where I worked to diversify the economy of a slave plantation that became “independent” in 1975.

JG: Yeah, me too…OK, let’s talk a little about your career in the learning space. Can you give me the highlights?

TM: I started as a Director at The John Marshall Law School producing training programs and synchronous satellite course for continuing legal education and judicial training. In 1995, I joined IBM Education and Training, Catapult Software Training as a business and P&L manager where I managed a staff of 150 technicians, instructional designers and software instructors providing tens of thousands of instructor lead training and performance based computer based training courses. I was named to the Presidents Club in 1997 as the top P&L manager for efficient managing of the $9m business unit supporting the strategic training needs of some of IBM’s largest clients such as McDonalds, Sears, Allstate and Boeing. From there I joined Allen Interactions as an e-learning consultant and worked with Dr. Michael Allen bringing better design and cognitive engagement to e-learning courses that made real business improvements for clients such as Intel, American Family Insurance, United Airlines and Ameritech. Then, in 2004, I joined the eLearning Guild as Director of Business Development. My focus was on bringing e-learning suppliers and software into the media company and, as a key member of the management team, I contributed to the growth of the membership, revenue, and profitability while helping the e-learning market as a whole to grow and succeed.

JG: Tim, after all this failure, I’m rethinking our decision to hire you…so you have held all these different roles at several prestigious companies in your career and have been really successful. What made you choose Tandem as your next endeavor?

TM: First of all, I started in the industry in a role where I was coming up with innovative ways of providing distributed learning to professionals. That was a pretty exciting way to start in this industry. Today, Tandem is engaged in so many of the newest and most exciting training methodologies. I just wanted to get back to my roots and help make a significant contribution to shaping the way organizations learn through Social Learning Technologies, Serious Games and Virtual Worlds. Second, I think Tandem is a really exciting company that, despite all of its success to date, is still in its early growth stages. The opportunity to come and be a part of that is a huge draw for me and I'm excited to be here.

JG: Well, let me say on behalf of all of us at Tandem, and our current and future clients, that we’re very glad you’re here.

ID/LXD, meet UXD Part 3: Prototyping

Usually, when I’m designing a learning experience that has no precedent, something that’s completely different from anything I’ve seen or designed before, I have a grand vision in my head of what the experience will be like for the learner. The problem with my grand visions is similar to the common phenomenon in dreams where you can’t see people’s faces. No matter how hard I squint my mind’s eye, I can’t see the details of every user interaction; I mostly have a high level picture, and more importantly, a sense or feeling of how the experience will play out.

While it’s important to have the sense or feeling that you want your learners to experience, the details do become critical at some point (like when a question from the developer prompts you to think for the first time “Hmmm, what DO I want that button to be called?).
Storyboarding is the standard for defining the user experience during the design process for a more traditional, linear learning format, and when you already have an interface template to work within. But when you’re creating something that is non-linear or that allows learners to take the reins and decide what they will do in the experience (like games), previous and next buttons are no longer helpful. You’ll need different tools to define the experience and communicate to the developers how it should all work.

As a User Experience Designer, prototyping was a standard step in the process. One of the purposes of the prototype was for usability testing exercises. However, it was also an incredibly helpful design tool because it forced me to define those details that were not clear in my vision and to work out the nuances of the interactions so I could create the feel and user experience I was going for.
Prototyping does not have to be time intensive or expensive. In some cases, prototyping may require an actual working portion of the site, module, or application. But as a design tool, simple hand drawn sketches or slides created using the drawing tools in Powerpoint will help tremendously.

Below, you can see a paper prototype I did, complete with cutout popup menus, for a recent game design (“The Change Game” – stay tuned for more on that). Pretty rudimentary, isn’t it? I’m no artist, but this was never intended to be shared with anyone (except the developers who thoughtfully waited to laugh at my art skillz until we were off the phone); it was really just an exercise to help me through the design process. I borrowed some colored pencils from the kids’ art supplies, sat on the floor and started drawing.

So, for your next project that requires a little outside the storyboard-box thinking… try it! Even if you just draw it on paper and no one ever sees it. Your end product will be better for it!

(And if you’re feeling brave, share your sketches here and let me know how it turns out!)